"The original Equal Pay Act of 1963 made it illegal for firms to pay different wages to women and men who performed equal work on jobs in the same establishment. Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act outlawed discrimination against women and minorities in all aspects of employment, including hiring, promotion and compensation. Additional protections came with the 1978 Pregnancy Discrimination Act; the 1991 amendments to Title VII, which boosted penalties for discrimination; and the 2009 Lilly Ledbetter Act, which essentially eliminated the time limit for filing discrimination claims." writes June E. O'Neill here in today's WSJ.  She adds, " In addition, for more than 40 years two major federal agencies have been dedicated to fighting labor-market discrimination: the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance."   So do we realy have equal pay for equal work in our country?  It seems to be based on all of the legislation and agencies that O'Neill writes about.  But this isn't enough for the feminist movement in our country, now they want new legislation because, "say the bill's sponsors, ..women earn 77% as much as men, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.?  Is this really true?  Not according to Phyllis Schafly in this article.  The reason is that the "this figure refers to the annual earnings of full-time, year-round workers. It doesn't compare comparable men and women, and it doesn't reflect that full-time men work 8%-10% more hours per week than full-time women."  Schfaly goes on, "The feminists want federal law to replace "equal pay for equal work" with "equal pay for equal worth." And they want "worth" to be decided by feminist bureaucrats and judges"...""Equal work" can be judged by objective factors such as experience, time in the labor force, hours worked per week, working conditions and the work actually done. "Worth" is a very subjective concept. Most people probably think they are worth more than they are being paid and deserve a raise."

The Forgotten Man has written about this subject before.  Not only should the government not be involved, but the statistics truly don't tell the whole story here.